


dum spiro spero

by thedevilchicken



Category: Original Work
Genre: Ancient Rome, Blood and Injury, Fights, Getting Together, Gladiators, M/M, Older Man/Younger Man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:34:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27321304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken
Summary: Castor is a gladiator and he has been for more than twenty years. He's used to the fighting, and to fulfilling the desires of Rome's elite.Following an injury, he's taken to a rich patrician's villa up the coast. Valens is handsome and familiar and twenty-six years old, and despite his better judgement, Castor finds him almost irresistibly attractive.But Valens has enemies. And Castor has a choice to make.
Relationships: Older Male Ancient Roman Gladiator/Younger Male Ancient Roman Patrician, Original Male Character/Original Male Character
Comments: 7
Kudos: 118
Collections: Fic In A Box





	dum spiro spero

**Author's Note:**

  * For [firecat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/firecat/gifts).



It was dusk when they arrived. 

The journey from Naples had only taken a couple of days but the roads on the way there had been unusually hard, or perhaps that was just Castor's injury speaking. He'd been healing with excruciating slowness for perhaps two months by that particular evening and though he'd been telling himself that he'd be fit to fight again in time for the governor's games, it had become increasingly obvious that that just wasn't true. He still couldn't lift his shield arm above shoulder height and even then, holding it there for any length of time felt like taking the spearpoint all over again. At his best guess, he was nearing his fortieth year; the lanista's physicians said the fact was he was just getting older and recovery would take him longer than the younger men. For a gladiator, he knew that didn't exactly bode well.

When he disembarked from the front seat of the cart, where he'd been bothering the taciturn driver for the past four hours, and jumped down to the dusty ground outside the back door of the villa, his shoulder was still aching. It was dusk, yes, and the sky was darkening rather rapidly above them, but the house wasn't quiet: the driver had stopped the cart right outside the kitchen door and inside a small army of servants was bustling. Castor leaned back against the side of the cart - it was empty, because all it had actually been conveying up the coast from Naples was _him_ \- and he wondered what in the name of all the gods he was doing there. No one had told him, which wasn't necessarily surprising, but the fact they were letting him stand there unchained and unguarded, trusting him not to run for the hills, was something relatively new. 

He didn't run, though. He probably could have, but frankly he was tired and hungry and he'd been a gladiator for far too long to feel like hiding in a cave and ending his life being eaten by a mountain lion. He might have fought a few in the arena over the years, but he'd usually had a sword in his hand at the very least - he didn't fancy his chances with only the clothes they'd dressed him in to defend himself, even if the travelling cloak he'd got wrapped around him against the chilly breeze blowing off the sea had a very pleasant thickness to it. Given he spent most of his waking hours dressed in only his subligaria, and maybe a bit of boiled leather armour if he was fighting, the tunic and cloak he was wearing were quite the step up.

"So, are you going to tell me where we are yet?" he asked the driver, but the man just shrugged and made a sour face. He'd been like that since Naples, though, so shocking it was not. 

"I believe he was told not to," someone else replied instead. Castor had to admit he hadn't even noticed the man approaching, though possibly because he'd been too busy peering past the low bushes and past the fence and out over the sea to where the sun had just set. The moon wasn't quite full that night but it was almost there and the waves caught the light. He hadn't seen the sea for a long, long time. 

"Any particular reason why?" Castor asked. 

The man smiled wanly. "We're all told what we need to know," he replied, in his commanding tone and faint Greek accent, nodding his head as if what he'd said was something very wise, but Castor couldn't have said if that meant the man knew the answer or not. Possibly not. But it was all oddly cloak and dagger for the sake of an ageing gladiator - it wasn't like they had to keep him in the dark for his own discretion because who would he have told? Everyone he knew was a gladiator.

The man told the driver to leave, so he did; he hopped back up onto the cart and urged the couple of tired old mules away toward what looked like it might be a stable. Then he returned his gaze to Castor. 

"Come with me," he said, and he turned and went inside without another word. Castor supposed there wasn't much else for it but to do as he'd been told; after all, he'd been doing that most of his life. 

He followed the man. He was short and grey-haired and slightly round at the middle but he carried himself like a man twice as tall and the staff inside the kitchen door all parted to make way for him; Castor was under no illusions that they parted for _him_ , large and occasionally imposing as he was, since they barely spared him more than a quick glance and most didn't bother looking at all. He followed the man out of the steam-filled, delicious-smelling kitchens full of fish and fruit and spices, and down a corridor under a shadowy portico, past a darkened garden courtyard with a pool at its centre. He could hear voices coming from the doors at the other side of the courtyard where light and laughter were spilling out in roughly equal measure - it was maybe a party, and he could have understood that, given how many parties he'd been sent to from the ludus over the years. Rich men and women loved to bring a gladiator in, sometimes armoured, sometimes sword in hand, and they'd have them fight or else just stand there like a flesh-and-blood version of one of their pretty marble statues. Sometimes, it was another kind of party, and they'd strip him down to his skin and draw lots to see who'd get to take him to bed. He didn't mind. Maybe it wasn't the same kind of rush he still got when he walked out into the arena to the cheers of the crowd, but it also didn't come with the risk of getting appendages casually lopped off. 

If there was a party, though, he didn't get to see it - the man kept moving, quickly, under an arch and through into a rougher single-storey wing of the villa that was, given its lack of frescoes and mosaics and its much narrower corridors, obviously the servants' quarters. The man opened a door and ushered Castor inside, so he went in, half expecting the door to be swiftly closed and locked behind him, but it wasn't. The man just lingered there in the doorway once Castor was inside, gave him a hard look and said, "I'll have someone bring you food and wine, and some water to wash with." He gestured at the room around him. "You'll sleep here." 

Castor frowned. "Where is _here_?" he asked. "And who are you?"

The man tucked his hands behind his back. He stood up even straighter, and lifted his chin until he was almost looking down his nose at Castor. It was quite a feat, considering the fact he gave away a good foot or so in height, at least. 

"My name is Apollodoros," he said. "Overseer of the estate. This is the villa of Lucius Vetruvius Valens."

He said the Roman's name like that should have meant something to him, and Castor supposed that if he hadn't been the sort of man who'd lived inside a ludus for thirty-odd years, it might indeed have meant something. As it was, though, it really didn't.

"Any idea what I'm doing here?"

Apollodoros smiled that same wan smile again. "I imagine you'll find out tomorrow," he said, which Castor surmised meant he didn't know, either. "The master is otherwise engaged tonight, but I'll ensure he's made aware of your arrival." 

He swept from the room without another word, apparently fond of grand exits. He didn't lock the door behind him, Castor noticed, which struck him as strange, but he did send food and wine and water with who harassed-looking women who could only say they didn't have time to talk to him as they bustled back out the still unlocked door. So Castor washed off the accumulated dirt of two days on the dusty road and gave his aching shoulder a prod over its thick linen strapping. It was still aching when he stretched out on the bed to sleep, but then again it always ached. He was almost starting to get used to it.

As he lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling with his good arm tucked up under his head, he still had no idea what he was doing there. But he'd eaten well and the bed was good and firm beneath him and, as the sounds of the party died down, he could hear the crash of waves against the cliffs not so very far away. The found it almost soothing.

And he had no idea who Lucius Vetruvius Valens was, but he supposed he'd find out soon enough. 

\---

A girl woke him in the morning. He was naked in bed and the screwed-up blanket just barely covered his dignity, but she looked neither scandalised nor particularly impressed; she gave him a look that fell somewhere halfway between amused and withering, set down a bowl and a cloth and a jug of hot water on the table just across the room, put fresh clothes down on the chair, and then swept back out again. He was even more naked and mid-wash when she came back with his breakfast; she looked him up and down while she put down the tray, raised her eyebrows at him pointedly, and then turned and left as he started to laugh. He supposed that was one way to start the day. 

Once he'd washed and dressed and eaten, he found himself leaning with his chest pressed up against the wall by the room's single high window. He was fortunately tall enough to see out of it, once he'd pushed the shutters open, he if pushed up onto his tiptoes, though he supposed he could have just stood on the chair. His room was next to a herb garden, it seemed, and the morning air smelled like rosemary mixed with salt blowing in from the sea. He could see that, too, if he strained forward and craned his neck to one side, and he was just starting to regret doing so since the familiar pain started prickling in his shoulder when the door opened and Apollodoros arrived. 

"Come with me," he said, once he'd looked him up and down much like the girl just had. She had the same expression, and the same eyes, the same thick black curls, and Castor couldn't help wondering if the two of them were related. He didn't have time to ask, though, even had he decided it was a good idea; Apollodoros exited again and Castor was left to trail along behind him. 

The villa was larger than he'd realised at first, he thought; there were at least ten individual bedrooms just in the servants' quarters, though it seemed some of them had multiple occupants, then the storerooms and the kitchens, and the smell of baking bread drifted in from past the vegetable garden. As they walked, he could see out through a wide colonnade into the land past the villa walls: he'd seen the vineyard stretching out down to the cliff tops when he'd arrived the previous evening but there was farmland, too, with animals grazing, and a small orchard. It was nothing like the ludus where he'd spent so many years. He wasn't sure he'd ever been anywhere like it.

They passed under an arch that led from the courtyard where the pool was and into a second courtyard, this one also surrounded by a portico but the centre was paved with stone instead of sunk and filled with water. There they found a man sitting on a wide stone bench up against a wall. He was wearing a fine white tunic and scowling at a tablet he was holding in one hand, which he put down when he noticed he wasn't alone. He barely looked at Apollodorus. His gaze went to Castor instead, almost immediately. 

"You can leave us, Apollodorus," he said. "I'm sure you have much more pressing things to occupy you." So Apollodorus gave a sort of half-bow and then withdrew quickly from the courtyard, back the way they'd come. 

The man sat there, looking at him, his elbows to his knees. Castor pulled himself up straighter, like when the lanista came down to the ludus for inspection, with his hands tucked behind his back and his chin tilted up. Then the man stood; he was younger than Castor had expected, perhaps not quite twenty-five years old but tall and broad-shouldered and had he not been quite so finely dressed, and had he not had that fine upright bearing, he might not have seemed out of place in the ludus with a sword in his hand or a net and a trident. He looked strong, and confident, with dark brown hair just an inch or two longer than the normal Roman style, and a smile already playing at the corners of his mouth. He looked familiar, though Castor couldn't say why; perhaps he'd come to the arena once upon a time.

"You know, I thought you'd be taller," the man said, as he came closer. 

Castor shrugged. "Am I not tall enough?" he asked. 

"I thought you'd be bigger," the man said, as he passed around behind him and gave one of Castor's bare arms a warm pat. 

"Am I not _big_ enough?" Castor replied. 

The man came back around in front of him, crossed his arms over his chest and tilted his head. "You look huge in the arena," he said.

"Well, there's probably still time to get your money back." 

The man chuckled. "I don't want a refund," he said.

"If you don't mind me saying so, you don't seem terribly impressed." 

"You're an injured, aging gladiator with more scars than I can count on both my hands," the man said, and he held both his hands out, palms up, as if to demonstrate. "But I'm willing to bet that if I gave you a sword, you could still strike me dead in a flash." He raised his eyebrows at him pointedly. "Please don't think I'm not impressed just because I'm teasing you, Castor. You'd be wrong." 

He stepped away. He turned his back, which seemed somewhat foolish after what he'd just said about swords and being struck dead, though Castor didn't believe for a moment that they weren't being watched and perhaps it was a test - if it was, he supposed he passed, because he just stood there and watched him walk away across the courtyard, back over to his bench. He picked up a sword that was leaning there by it, albeit a wooden one, and he threw it to him; Castor caught it by the hilt and swung it, testing its balance. It was weighted, maybe some metal in the hilt, and sat well in his hand.

"Is this why I'm here?" he asked, as he tapped the flat of the wooden blade against his other hand. "You want to watch me fight? Most men would just go to the arena for that, you know." 

"No, that's not why you're here," the man replied. 

"Then you have a son or two you want me to teach?" 

He shook his head. "No," he said. "I've no wife, let alone sons."

"A bodyguard, then?"

"I have other men for that." He looked Castor up and down. "Not as imposing, I'll grant you, but professional." 

"Then what?"

He picked up a second wooden sword and came back across the courtyard. He slapped the blunt blade against the palm of his opposite hand - Castor noted that he'd taken the sword left-handed, and he swung it left-handed, and seemed comfortable holding it as he came closer, more so than he'd have expected of a man in a tunic quite that nice. 

"The truth is, I'm bored here," he said, with a wry twist to his mouth. "I wanted something to take my mind off accounts and trades and greasing palms." He held the sword out not quite to arm's length, the tip toward Castor's chest, though the shake he gave it said it was more indication than threat. "That's where you come in."

"You want me to entertain you?"

"Do you find that offensive?"

"It's not my place to find it much of anything." 

He laughed. He was a handsome man, Castor couldn't help but notice, and even more so when he laughed like that and made the corners of his dark eyes crinkle. He had a good solid frame and a good strong jaw and a small scar that cut diagonally across both lips just by the left side corner, pale like it was almost as old as he was. He had thick arms and slim hips and muscular thighs that, just for a second, Castor could almost imagined wrapped around his waist. The thought made him smile.

"I didn't bring you here so you could bow and scrape and call me master," the man said. "My name is Lucius Vetruvius Valens and if you need to call me anything at all, you'll call me Valens. If you have an opinion, I want to hear it. If you have something to say, I want you to say it. Do you understand?"

Castor nodded. He supposed that he did understand; Lucius Vetruvius Valens was probably a rich young patrician surrounded by sycophants and bored out of his mind by the duties that came with his position, and Castor had seen that all so many times before; perhaps his home was grander than the others, and there were more people working for him both in his house and in his fields, and he wouldn't have been surprised to find his uncle was a senator or his father was a general, or else governor of some far-flung corner of the empire, but he wasn't all that different from the others. Perhaps that was why he looked familiar: he was the same as so many men Castor had met before. He just hadn't come out and said if he wanted to fight him or fuck him, at least not just yet. 

"I understand," he said, and Valens smiled broadly. He tucked his wooden sword underneath one arm and stepped in to squeeze Castor's good shoulder warmly. 

"Good," he said. "Because I'm counting on your company to get me through some very dry negotiations." Then he frowned slightly as his other hand drifted over the straps still binding Castor's bad shoulder. Castor winced, maybe preemptively because actually he barely touched at all, and Valens nodded. 

"I'll call someone to see to that," he told him. "I know an excellent physician." Then he nodded sharply and turned away, and went back to his bench, and Castor watched him go. The line of his back under his tunic was strong and straight and his legs were long, muscular, as if he preferred activity to sitting on his arse reading letters and Castor, with the wooden sword still in his hand, really wouldn't have minded fighting him. He looked like the sort of man who'd had the best education money could buy and excelled both physically and intellectually. He'd have won, of course, even with his injured shoulder - very nearly all that Castor knew was fighting, after all - but it might have been enjoyable all the same.

"Are you going to join me or just stand there staring?" Valens asked, from his bench, with a tilt of his head and a teasing half-smile, and Castor laughed as he made his way toward him. He could have stood to stare a little longer, but he did appreciate the seat.

He'd probably miss the ludus, he thought. But maybe it wouldn't be a bad few weeks until he inevitably went home again. 

\---

Honestly, even accounting for his optimism, the days that followed were better than he could have expected. 

Life in the villa was strange for a man who'd spent his entire adult life in the ludus. He'd grown up initially on the streets of Naples, poor and skinny and never quite not hungry, never knowing who his parents had been or how he'd ended up where he was: living in the filth under the piers and jetties by the docks. They called him _Castor the Gaul_ when they cheered him into the arena, but he was fairly sure he wasn't Gaulish. He was fairly sure he'd never been further away from Naples than he was right then, except a trip or two to Rome over the years. After all, all his memories of his childhood were of stealing food by the docks and running away until his lungs burned, and that one night when he wouldn't give up the fish he'd bought because he'd actually _bought_ it, with money he'd earned doing shitty jobs for a money-lender. He'd stabbed the man who'd tried to steal from him. The next thing he'd known, he'd been sentenced to the ludus. Frankly, though, the ludus had been better to him in the years that followed than the streets had ever been before. 

Life in the ludus had a certain pace: they trained almost relentlessly, bathed, ate, joked, and were cared for as the lanista's assets - they earned him money even if they lost the fight, but training a new gladiator took time and money and ate into the profits and anyway, who wanted to lose? Life in the villa was bustling and busy, though that sense was mostly kept away from the main house; as soon as Castor stepped back past the open courtyard with its surprisingly large central bathing pool and neatly manicured gardens, underneath the portico and through the doors into the servants' areas, the quiet calm of the rest of the villa seemed to disappear. He didn't spend his time there, though. He'd expected to train alone outdoors, and try to exercise his injured shoulder, and occasionally find himself called to sit with Valens when it appealed to his whims, but his routine wasn't quite like that. 

On the second morning and then every morning thereafter, once the girl - she eventually huffed and said her name was Theodora so he could stop calling her _girl_ \- had woken him, he and Valens ate breakfast together in Valens' study while he complained about his newly-received letters. They exercised together in the courtyard where they'd met each morning shortly after that, once Valens had met briefly with Apollodorus, though Castor's shoulder still bothered him and Valens, surprisingly, seemed somewhat concerned. On the third day, and then occasionally afterwards, they walked for miles around the estate, or along the cliff's edge looking out at the sea, or rode horses; Castor had never been taught to ride and that morning, the sixth day after his arrival, Valens pulled himself up onto his huge black horse and leaned to hold a hand out down to him. 

"I promise you'll enjoy it," Valens said, when Castor looked up at him skeptically. He pressed one hand over his heart. "On the gods, Castor. I know I'm a spoiled little boy but I do know how to ride." 

Castor smiled and shook his head and took Valens' hand. He pulled him up behind him, and they took off across the fields at a terrible pace. 

Afterwards, what stuck with him most was how precarious he felt at first, legs dangling, the horse surging forward, until Valens reached back and pulled one of Castor's hands up to his waist. "Hold on," he told him, barely audible over the whip of the wind across his face and past his ears. "Don't be so shy!" So Castor set his hands at Valens' waist, after first, but that didn't seem much better. He wrapped his arms around him next, one hand gripping his opposite wrist, and he leaned forward, his chest pressed up tight to Valens' back. He was a confident rider, and the horse was magnificent, and once they'd sped through the field and made their way down a steep cliffside path, once they were down right by the water's edge where the sand was firm and damp, they eventually came to a stop. Castor dismounted awkwardly. Valens hopped down in front of him, sandaled feet splashing in the shallow waves. 

"When was the last time you saw the sea?" Valens asked, still turned away from Castor as he gave his horse's mane a stroke and then reached up to give him a pat between the ears. 

"When we went to the games in Capua," Castor replied. "Eight years ago, I think. Maybe nine?"

"I think I was there that day," Valens told him, _still_ turned away. "My father's sister lives there. It was a hot day."

"I remember. I could barely see for the sweat in my eyes." 

"You fought well." 

"I lost." 

Valens shrugged. He turned to him then, and looked up at him, though his gaze didn't go straight to his face; it started at his throat just above the neck of his tunic and made Castor swallow, moved up over his stubbly chin and the thick scar at one cheekbone, and _then_ he met his eyes. 

"I think we both know sometimes winning and losing has more to do with luck than skill," Valens said. "Nine years ago, you could have beaten anyone." 

Castor scoffed good-naturedly. "Nine years ago you were what, twelve years old?" he said.

Valens laughed. "I'm twenty-six," he replied. "I was seventeen when I was last at Capua. My uncle...afterwards, he took me to one of Canio's gatherings." His mouth twisted wryly. "You were there." 

Castor shrugged, one-shouldered so it wouldn't hurt. "They never give us names," he said. "I wouldn't know Canio from any other rich man in Capua." But suddenly it all made a certain kind of sense to him, because it was a day that he remembered. He remembered Valens - he'd just never known his name. He supposed at least now he knew why he'd seemed familiar when they'd met.

"You were fucking a servant girl for their amusement," Valens said.

"Well, I don't usually get a say in that. The girl either, for that matter." 

"I always wondered if Canio kept you there all night. Do people do that?"

"Sometimes." He frowned. And he wanted to ask him, _so, is that what you want?_ but he couldn't summon up the words for it. He could almost see himself on a couch in Valens' villa, naked and fucking - Theodora was just the pretty sort of girl that rich men liked to have him screw, maybe eighteen or nineteen, all pale skin and expressive eyes and breasts just large enough that they'd hang down and shimmy if he had her on all fours. He supposed he wouldn't have been surprised if that turned out to be precisely what Valens liked, though he might have been disappointed - Theodora was not the one who'd caught his interest. He didn't ask, though; instead, they walked quietly on the beach for another few minutes, side by side, Valens leading his horse by the bridle. 

And when, a few days later, Valens spent an hour or so teaching him to ride, Castor realised he didn't really want to learn. He remembered how it felt to sit there, pressed to him, arms around his waist; poor and misguided a notion as it was, he'd have liked to have felt that again. 

He wasn't interested in Theodora. He liked her - once she warmed up out of her surly phase, she was full of wit and fire and bluntly funny in a way that made him laugh until she couldn't help but smile back at him. He liked her - if he'd been twenty years younger, maybe he'd have daydreamed about them running off together. But he was forty years old or thereabouts and he'd never spared much thought to children, marriage, happy ever after. He'd thought more about which of his opponents might be the one to kill him.

He wasn't interested in Theodora; Valens was the one he wanted. And it seemed he didn't remember everything about that day in Capua, but Castor wouldn't be the one to remind him.

\---

A week passed. 

He'd expected to be an occasional distraction but Valens had him stay in the room when visitors came to the villa, and try as he might Castor couldn't see that it was meant as an insult to the people he was talking to. They seemed interested, actually: conversation drifted from general social niceties straight into the arena once Valens introduced him and Castor told them stories about fights they remembered, like the time he beat Old Titus at the theatre in Rome, or got mauled by lions fighting Cyrus of Crete - not that he thought they had many lions where Cyrus was from, and that definitely wasn't Crete. He didn't mind talking about it, not when they all looked so scandalised and so enthralled, and Valens sat back on his couch with a smile as he watched him. Against all better judgement, he liked that smile. He would have talked for hours just to keep him smiling. Once or twice, he did, like he'd tried to do that night they'd met almost ten years before. He'd seemed so sad, and all he'd wanted was to help, but now Castor's reasons were much more selfish. Once upon a time those reasons had been relatively pure, and now they led him to wrap one hand around his cock in bed at night.

A second week passed by. Castor understood from Apollodoros that Valens was a rich man, and a popular man, who ordinarily lived in Rome but he'd come out to the estate a few months prior, following his grandfather's death. The men and women who came calling were a mixture of his friends from Rome come to spend a little time out in the countryside and his grandfather's old business partners come to see if the inheritor would honour his predecessor's commitments and if they could, if not quite swindle him, at least manoeuvre him into a less advantageous financial position. Castor didn't know much about business - he only knew how to read because a rich widow had wanted him to recite erotic poetry for her twice a month - but Valens seemed pleased with the outcome. He seemed even more pleased that Castor remembered some of the poetry; it made him laugh out loud in something very nearly like delight. Castor, in spite of himself, wished he'd had a rather different reaction.

At the end of the second week, a physician arrived. They took Castor into Valens' favourite courtyard, the one where they trained each morning, because that was where the sunlight was brightest and fewest people might come to see; Valens, to whom modesty meant very little after so long in the ludus, stripped down to his subligaria and took a seat, though he didn't expect it would be Valens instead of the physician who stepped in to remove the strapping from his shoulder. He felt his face turn just a little hot as Valens' fingers brushed his skin. He felt himself swallow as he looked down to see his hands on him, revealing the twisted scar from his most recent opponent's spear. He couldn't even remember the man's name; he remembered he was Persian or something like that, young, with long black hair that made Castor's seems blonder than it really was and speed that Castor had been lacking for at least five years. And before Castor had killed him, he'd pushed his spear into Castor's shoulder. He could still remember how much it had bled.

The physician spoke Greek to Valens and Apollodoros once he was done poking and prodding and pulling him this way and that; Castor caught a few words here and there but Greek had never been his specialty. Then all three of them looked at him, intently, and he made a somewhat suspicious face.

"What are you going to do?" he asked, and when Valens explained, he sort of wished he hadn't asked at all. They gave him a thick leather belt to bite down on as he sat there on the high-backed chair and Valens stepped in close to press him tight against that high back by his good shoulder. He clasped one of Castor's wrists in his hand and Castor held on, too. For a start, when the physician cut him, it was fine, but then he fished around inside the incision with a pair of metal forceps and Castor bit down hard as he squeezed Valens' wrist, feeling the muscles all stand out down the sides of his neck. Valens' arm was white where his fingers were gripping but when Castor met his eyes, he kept him there. He bared his teeth, breathing through them shakily - years in the arena hadn't magically made him insensitive to pain, after all. And then the physician drew back with a triumphant sound as he brandished the very point of the dead Persian's fucking spear clamped between his tongs.

"Well, that explains why it still hurt," Castor muttered, as the physician started to stitch him back up, and Valens chuckled as he rubbed his wrist. It was rapidly turning red in the pattern of Castor's fingers, but he patted Castor's prickly cheek and told him not to worry. And after, once Apollodoros was seeing the physician to a room for the night before he'd travel back to wherever he'd arrived from, once Castor's shoulder was neatly stitched, Valens asked Theodora to bring a jug and cloth and bowl into his study. He picked up Castor's tunic, raised his brows at him, then walked away; Castor guessed, apparently correctly, that he was meant to follow.

In the study, Valens had him sit. There was blood on his skin and Valens washed it off, slowly, letting water run over his shoulder and down over his side, soaking into his subligaria and dripping down onto the tiled floor. He washed him, careful of the neat little row of stitches at the surprisingly small incision - apparently he'd been right about the physician's level of expertise. And then, when he was done, he put the cloth back into the bowl and gestured for him to stand. He stood.

Castor hadn't been what he might have considered small since his first few years in the ludus, and even then he wasn't _small_. He was a big man, bigger than almost everyone he'd ever fought, and as he stood there with Valens, the difference between them was appreciable. Castor's skin looked ruddy at best next to Valens' even tan and Castor's short blonde hair looked almost ridiculous next to the dark brown gloss of Valens' that curled slightly against his forehead. He knew his own eyes were blue, though admittedly mostly from other people telling him, and Valens' were a kind of burnt honey colour. His shoulders were broader than Valens', his thighs thicker, chest broader, and while Valens was not a short man by any stretch of the imagination, Castor stood half head taller at the very least. But his chest felt tight even past the throbbing of his shoulder as Valens' damp hands went down to the wet cloth of Castor's subligaria. He untied it, his eyes on what he as doing as Castor watched him do it, feeling the backs of his warm fingers brush against his abdomen. He untired it, then let the cloth drop to the floor, baring him completely.

So this was it, he thought - this was what Valens wanted. He was standing there in Valens' study, naked except for the sandals on his feet as he watched Valens' gaze move over him, and if it hadn't been for the persistent throbbing in his shoulder, he was fairly sure his cock that Valens had just conspicuously bared would have already been halfway to attention. He almost expected Valens to instruct him to bend down over his desk and spread his legs and he'd have done it, too, he had no illusions about lack of compliance; he'd have leaned there getting blood and come all over Valens' important papers as he took it up the arse, and he'd probably have liked it. The thought of it made his stomach twist and his balls feel tight and he was struck with the thought that he'd have liked to have kissed him. He'd have liked to have pressed his mouth to his and torn his pretty tunic from the neck down to the hem just to get at his skin underneath, and the force of that desire struck him straight in the gut, hot and unexpected. He'd have liked to have fucked him or been fucked or just stroked their cocks together until it was both of them making a mess of Valens' nice tidy study and not just him. It almost took his breath away.

But Valens didn't tell him to do anything at all, much less bend over. He took a slow and not quite steady breath, he smiled genially, and he handed him a cloth to dry himself off with, then he set about washing his own hands like nothing had just happened at all. And, once he was dry, Castor pulled his tunic on and went back to his own room. It wasn't until he was lying on his bed, on doctor's orders to get some rest, that he realised he'd left his fucking underwear in Valens' study. Of course he had.

Then again, he guessed he didn't need underwear if all he was going to do was wrap his hand around his cock and stroke, with an image of the master of the house lodged firmly in his head.

\---

In the third week, there was a different visitor. 

For several days after the physician's visit, things proceeded just as they had before: they ate together, walked together, entertained Valens' guests together, generally continued as if nothing had happened that day at all and maybe, he supposed, for Valens it really hadn't. Maybe he'd read too much into it and Valens wasn't interested in him at all - just because so many other rich Romans had been over the years, that really didn't mean anything about _this_ rich Roman, after all, and Castor hardly expected a grand romance. At most he'd expected a quick fuck in a semi-convenient location and if that was what he needed, he could take care of himself in bed at night and still face Valens in the morning.

Things continued as normal. Theodora woke him in the mornings, sometimes a little earlier than strictly necessary, and she'd sit at the table by the little window that looked out over the herb garden and they'd talk while he stripped and washed himself because apparently she was as unconcerned with modesty and proper behaviour as he was. It turned out Apollodoros actually was her father, and it was just the two of them since her mother had died, and she'd never really been anywhere except the villa, which probably explained why she liked hearing stories about the ludus - not the arena, though she hadn't seen a fight there either, but life in other places seemed to fascinate her. Castor said maybe Apollodoros should ask Valens if he'd take her to Rome the next time he went back and she snorted at him like that was ridiculous. No one from the servants' quarters talked to Valens like that, she said, or at least no one but him. He supposed that was true, when he thought about it.

That day, Theodora woke him just like normal and she asked him questions while she sat on the table, swinging her legs. He stood there, naked, sloshing a cloth around under his armpits and under his balls, and she laughed at him when he told her the reason he hadn't just run away from Valens' estate was basically just that he had nowhere else to go and no skills to go there with.

"Well, it's not like I know how to raise goats or make wine or grow pears," he said, frowning at her as she threw him a cloth to dry off with.

"You'd learn," she told him. "Or you'd marry a rich old widow who wanted you for your muscles, not your pear trees."

And he laughed, and flicked water at her across the room, but an hour later he was walking through the pear orchard at Valens' side. When Valens picked a pear from one of the trees, gave it a quick buff against his tunic and then bit in, Castor almost rolled his eyes at himself; Valens definitely wasn't a rich widow, and he definitely didn't grow the pears himself. But then Valens offered him the pear that he'd just started and Castor took it; juice ran down the inside of his wrist when he took a bite and Valens caught his arm, lifted it up, and chased that line of pear juice with his tongue. He laughed as he pulled back again and walked away through the orchard like it was nothing at all, but it didn't feel much like _nothing_ to Castor. Valens' tongue against his skin felt very much like _something_ , as did the faint bruises at his wrist in the shape of Castor's fingers.

When they got back to the villa, though, before Castor had the chance to slip away back to his room, a new visitor arrived. He could see Valens' jaw tense as the name was announced, though he stood and he smiled and made every possible courtesy as the man sat down with his haughty entourage. There were no tales of the arena that afternoon; the visitor paid Castor and his healing shoulder no attention at all, except for one hard glance when he entered the room, and he wasn't completely sure that Valens didn't have him stay that time precisely as an insult, unlike all the times that he'd been there before. He supposed if this was the kind of man who'd take it that way, maybe he deserved it. 

The visit was not pleasant but did run on for several hours, until the sun had set and civility seem to be stretching fairly thin. There were two men and two women with Valens' guest, evidently his son and his daughter and their spouses, and they all appeared to hold Valens in the same kind of barely-concealed contempt - it was interesting, considering every other guest that he'd received since Castor's arrival, no matter their status or the deepness of their coffers, had seemed to like him well enough even if they didn't like his business dealings. This meeting, though, outlasted almost all of them and started fraying Valens' patience; Castor had learned to read situations both in and out of the arena over the years, which he supposed was why he'd lasted as long as he had, and almost three weeks living with the man had given him some insight into his temperament. Fortunately, however, before Valens' pleasant demeanour could snap - which might have been his guest's intent - they had to leave.

Once they'd gone, Valens huffed out a breath and tugged on his own hair and gave Castor a grateful, tired smile. "Thank you for staying," he said. "You being there made that much more bearable." But before Castor could say anything, especially not _I didn't think I really had a choice_ , Valens gave his shoulder a pat and then started off back inside the villa. "I'm going to take a swim," he said as he went, and when he glanced back over his shoulder and raised his eyebrows at Castor, he supposed that was his cue to follow.

He followed. He followed Valens past the impluvium, past the dining room where they'd spent so many hours with Valens' not very welcome guest, through the corridors and under arches, underneath the portico around his usual courtyard. The pool was surrounded by neat gardens with small mosaic paths leading through the greenery, up to the water's edge; there were pictures of the gods in the mosaics, Jove here and Apollo there, Minerva, Venus, visible in the moonlight that shone in past the tiled roofs of the surrounding colonnade. Neither of them had thought to bring a lamp and that didn't seem to matter when Valens crouched to remove his sandals and then stripped himself in very short order right down to his bare skin, with his back turned to Castor. And then, with no further ado, he jumped straight in.

"Are you coming?" Valens asked, once he'd swum to the far side and back again. He crossed his arms on the edge of the pool and rested his chin on top of them to look up at him. 

"I can't swim," Castor replied.

"You don't need to," Valens said, then he stood up straight; the water came up to his armpits, which meant it would be lower still on Castor, and _that_ meant he had no excuse at all. Especially as his stitched shoulder had been healing well. So, he took a deep breath and he dropped down into a crouch to untie his sandals and slip take them off. He pushed up again and he untied the belt from around his waist and he really couldn't help but notice that Valens was watching as he did so, leaning there at the pool's edge again. He didn't need to look at him directly to know that when he pulled his tunic off over his head, Valens' eyes were on him. He didn't need to look at him to know he was watching when his subligaria joined his tunic and belt on the ground. Valens had seen him naked once before, if you didn't count a party one day back in Capua. As he glanced down at met his gaze, just for a moment, he thought he probably should count Capua after all.

"So I just...jump in?" he asked.

"That's the best way for it," Valens replied, so he jumped; he supposed after the fact, once the shock of the freezing water wore off, that it _was_ the best way; if he'd sat down and put his feet in first, he'd probably have told him exactly where he could put his swimming pool. As it was, though, he cursed rather colourfully and made Valens laugh, which he supposed was an improvement on the rest of the night.

Valens swam a little while Castor watched, lingering by the edge of the pool. He spread his arms out and let his feet float up a little underneath the water as he gripped the lip of the pool, and Valens swam. He was good at it, Castor thought, though he supposed he didn't exactly have much of a basis for comparison given where he'd spent the majority of his life. And he could see the shape of him through the water when he stopped at the opposite side and spread his arms out, too. He could see the way the muscles lay across his shoulders, trim but firm from exercise. He could see the way his collarbones swept out toward his shoulders and he'd liked to have pressed his fingers there, or else his mouth. Valens' dark hair looked even darker now it was soaked through and though the water distorted his view, he could see down the length of his torso, between his legs, to the vague outline of the manhood about which he'd been fantasising almost since the time that they'd first met. He was handsome man - Castor had no idea how he wasn't married, or why he had no lover, unless there were strange Roman politics at play that he didn't understand or else Valens had many lovers, but they were all waiting for him back in Rome. There, though, at his family's estate in the countryside, Castor would have known if he'd had anyone. Not only was Theodora so wonderfully indiscreet that she'd have told him almost immediately, but they spent so much time together that he'd simply have smelled it on him.

Valens ran the fingers of one hand through his hair as he looked at him, raking it back from his face. Valens ran that hand over his mouth and down to his throat where he gave a momentary squeeze, then dipped it back under the water. Then he pushed off from the edge of the pool and came closer, dove under and then popped just a few feet away. The water on his skin seemed to almost shimmer in the moonlight and the way he looked at him...Castor couldn't bear to look if it was just bound to end in solitary masturbation yet again. So he turned his back, raised his arms onto the chilly stone-paved edge of the pool, and rested his chin against his forearm. 

"I didn't realise I was so dreadful to look at," Valens said, an amused sort of note to his voice. 

"You're not," Castor replied. He glanced back over one shoulder, just for a moment, and then turned away again. "You're really not."

He heard the faint splash of the water as he Valens came closer. He saw his hands appear to either side of his elbows as he bracketed him with his arms, though still not touching. He felt his breath against his wet skin as he sighed. And he expected him to say more, because Valens never exactly lacked words - he expected him to make a joke and back away, swim a few lengths and then decide that it was time for him to go to bed, but that wasn't what he did. What he did was move, yes, but he only moved one of his hands. Castor felt Valens' fingertips against his back, and it made him shiver. He felt them move down, slowly, following the line of his spine as it disappeared under the water. He felt two fingers find the indent by the cleft of his arse and press there against his coccyx as his heart thumped so strongly in his chest that suddenly his whole body felt warm despite the chilly water. And then Valens' fingers dipped down lower, skimmed his cleft then pressed between to find his hole. He felt his shoulders tense and his face flush and his cock, despite the cold, give a good, hard twitch of interest.

"So, who was your friend?" he asked, quickly. His voice sounded strained and he had to clear his throat, and he wasn't sure what had possessed him to say anything at all, but by then it was too late. 

Valens rested his forehead down between Castor's shoulders. "Oh, he's not my friend," he said, his voice low and close, as he rubbed a little at the tight rim of Castor's hole. He chuckled rather mirthlessly and his fingers left him; instead, Castor felt the length of Valens' cock press up against his cleft. He felt his hands drop to his hips. He felt him rock against him just a fraction, and heard the way that his breath caught. "I suspect that Quintus Varo killed my grandfather," he said. "And if he doesn't send someone to kill me too before the month is out, let's just say I'll be surprised by that." 

He didn't seem happy, but he didn't seem surprised. He also didn't seem like he was joking. And, after a moment in which Castor found not a single thing to say, Valens pushed away from him and climbed up out of the pool. He turned to him, naked, dripping water all over the tiles, and Castor could see how hard his cock was, flushed deep red up towards the tip, thick and long and tantalising. He gave Castor a look, a hard look, frowning, then he walked away quickly and Castor thought that was it but a minute later he returned, with a sword in his hands. 

Valens crouched to put the sword down on the tiles by where Castor was still leaning. He leaned forward briefly and ran one hand over Castor's hair, which was still soaked through and longer than it had been in years. He ran the backs of his fingers against his jaw and then stood up again. 

"When they come, I don't want you to be defenceless," he said. "I'd prefer them to be taken by surprise." Then he walked away again, and this time he didn't come back. He didn't seem to care that he'd just armed a hired gladiator and left his clothes behind.

Castor sighed and pulled himself up out of the water. He took the sword, and his clothes, and dripped his way back to his room, wondering why in the name of all the gods he'd just stopped Valens from touching him. And, once he'd dried himself off and stretched out in bed, the sword lying on the floor within arm's reach, he thought back over the other thing - the fact he'd seemed to sure that his rude guest wanted him dead, he just didn't know precisely when. 

Castor supposed at least he had an advantage there: in the arena, he always saw the next attack coming. 

\---

The attack came in the night, toward the end of the fourth week. 

There were several days of relative normality, wherein Theodora teased him about the fact that Valens had given him a weapon _and_ wondered why he didn't just take it and run considering how much he could probably sell it for, and the bruises still at Valens' wrist faded away into nothing. The physician returned to check on Castor's shoulder and pronounced himself pleased with his progress, then carefully removed the stitches so that Castor would stop scratching at them. They rode out to the vineyard, twice. They walked down to the beach and Valens swam in the sea, naked, while Castor sat in the sand and pretended not to watch. He liked the salt smell of it, perhaps because it was nothing like the docks where he'd grown up, and when he looked up and down the beach he could see for miles. Of course, the only thing that interested him was Valens as he strode back out of the waves like a gift come straight from Venus. But it was fine, though, he told himself - four weeks were almost over and even rich as he was, surely he wouldn't have paid for more than a month.

There were several days of relative normality, and then normality passed. The attack that Valens had expected finally came.

When he woke, as the screaming started, he knew he didn't have to fight. He could see firelight through his room's small window and there was smoke in the air, and shouting - chances were he could have slipped out unseen in the confusion, even big as he was, or killed just enough of the small army of attackers he saw when he pressed up to the wall and peered out the window that he could have escaped the estate relatively unscathed. He didn't have to fight, no, but the first thing he saw as he opened his door with sword in hand was Apollodoros barring the door to Theodora's room from a man with a sword and an unpleasant smile who had blood dripping from his hands. At that point, he knew he was going to fight. 

He killed the man at Theodora's door before he'd even realised anyone else was there; he snapped his neck then bent, picked up the fallen man's fallen sword, and passed it to Theodora - honestly, he thought she stood a better chance of swinging it and hitting what she aimed for than her father did, for all his bluster. Then, barefoot and still in just his subligaria, he went for Valens. He couldn't think of anything else that he should do, and could only hope he wasn't too late already.

He didn't expect it to be easy and it wasn't - there were men in the halls crossing swords with Valens' bodyguards, the occasional curtain set on fire by a stray torch, one of the cooks screaming...so he ploughed on through it, shoulder down and sword in hand, his heart hammering in his chest though frankly it wasn't even close to to the level of his most strenuous training, let alone his most strenuous fight. The stakes, though, seemed infinitely higher, and he bared his teeth as he shoved men aside, bounced heads off walls, put his sword where most sharp things weren't meant to go. He needed to find him, _needed_ to, and he found him in the courtyard, barefoot just like he was though in a bloodied tunic, sword in one hand and knife in the other. There were four men there, backing him into a corner, clearly ready to kill him, and it would have been extremely simple to just let them and then left, stolen money and food and made a new life for himself somewhere they didn't know the name _Castor of Gaul_. He could have let them do what they'd come there to do. He absolutely didn't. 

The first man had Castor's sword through his back before he even saw him coming and he dropped to the floor at Castor's feet. The second got two swings in before Castor dropped to one knee on the bloody ground and slashed both his thighs; it took him down quickly, then Castor plunged his sword straight into his chest, one quick stab as he came back up to his feet. Valens took the third man while he was busy gawking at the first two and the fourth - Castor strode in, took Valens' knife out of his hand and threw it, bringing him down as he ran. 

"You saved my life," Valens said, as they stood there with their swords still dripping at their sides. "Perhaps I should hire you as a bodyguard after all." 

Castor laughed. He was literally dripping with other men's blood, almost slipping in it with his bare feet on the courtyard's paving stones, wearing nothing but a loincloth and his chest hair. Valens' tunic was soaked in blood that wasn't his straight down his front from his neck down to his knees and were he honest, Castor hadn't felt quite so alarmingly confused in weeks. The weight of the sword in his hand and the heat of the blood on his skin should have been familiar almost to the point of being comforting, but he'd felt nothing but blind fucking panic - panic that Lucius Vetruvius Valens might have died before he found him. At home in the ludus, he might have been known for his friendliness, but he'd never been known for his sentimentality; he'd lost far too many friends in the arena for that, and yet the fact remained that he'd become...attached. He wished he hadn't. 

"I don't want to be your bodyguard," Castor replied. 

"Then what _do_ you want?"

He'd have liked to have shown him precisely what he wanted. He'd have liked to have dropped his sword in the bloody dirt and pressed his mouth to his, got his bloody fingers in his hair and on his skin and shown him what he wanted was _him_. Not a job that would take him away from the ludus and put the object of his desires so close but nowhere he could touch. Not providing entertainment for his guests, as pleasant as they mostly seemed, at least aside from the one that had ordered his swift and bloody death. He wanted _him_ , stripped out of his fine clothes and pushed up roughly against the nearest wall, or in his bed that wasn't even really his because his own was in a small room off the training yard at the ludus of Sextus Gavius, back two days down the coast on the outskirts of Naples. And for all he could imagine Valens fighting in the arena, wearing pretty Roman armour and possibly even winning, he couldn't imagine him visiting him there, either. He didn't want him to - not when he'd known him like this.

"I want to go home," he said, instead of doing any of the things he wanted to. "Before I do something I'll regret." 

"And why would you regret it, this thing you're hoping to avoid?"

Castor's mouth twisted. "Because one day I'll die in the arena," he said. "And the best that I can hope for is that you'll be there to watch." 

The house was quieting down as they stood there together. One of the guards came by to report the all clear: the bandits - likely Varo's mean - had been killed or run off to the very last man, at the cost of three guards and a stablehand who'd been the one who'd raised the alarm. Valens nodded, and he thanked the guard, but his eyes didn't leave Castor. Then, once they were alone again, once small fires were being doused and blood cleared away and Theodora, bloodied sword in hand, was leading her father back to his room, Valens told him, "Follow me." 

He followed him, just like he'd followed him since that first day. He trailed along behind him and at first he wondered where they might be going, if Valens had had enough and Castor's little speech was going to see him put directly on a cart and sent off back to Naples, but that wasn't where they were going. He wondered if they might go upstairs to Valens' room, but they didn't take the stairs and that seemed fanciful anyway. Valens made his way through the courtyards, past the pool, through the arches, down the portico and through the door into the servants' quarters, picking his way over smudges of blood. He pushed open Castor's door and held it as he gestured for him to go inside. He did, because he wasn't sure what else he should do, and he set his bloody sword down on the floor so it wouldn't stain the table. Theodora would have likely never let him live that down.

"There's something I've avoided telling you since you arrived," Valens said, "but I think it's about time you knew." 

Castor frowned, and he was about to ask what that was, or maybe say it didn't matter, or any of a hundred other things that might get Valens out of the room so he could break his fist against a wall in peace for his own fucking stupidity that he'd allowed himself to feel anything for this man of all men, but Valens raised a hand and Castor clenched his jaw instead. 

"I didn't hire you," Valens said, clenching his fists. "I may have misled you into believing that, or at least not corrected your assumption, but this is not some sort of rental agreement with your lanista."

Castor frowned. "So then you bought me?" he asked. 

Valens made a face and gestured vaguely as he shook his head. "No," he said. "No, I bought your freedom. I understand it was a sentence for a crime but there are very few problems that can't be solved with the direct application of gold." 

"Then I'm...free to go?"

Valens shrugged widely, his hands upturned. "Yes," he said, and he stepped away from the open doorway, leaving it free for Castor to walk through if he chose to. "You can return to the ludus if you'd like to, by all means. I'm sure Gavius would be pleased to take you back. But you're free to go wherever you'd like to." 

He took a breath. He ran one hand over his hair and then gestured at the door, still standing open, nothing in his way. "If you prefer to go, I'll arrange for you to have a horse, a change of clothes, food, money, whatever you might need for your journey. But I hoped that you'd choose to stay."

Castor's frown deepened. "You want me to stay?" he asked. " _Here_?"

"I do, yes." 

" _Why_?"

Valens smiled faintly. He shook his head and glanced up to the window, through which Castor could see dawn beginning to break. 

"Because when I was seventeen years old and my father had just died, not even a full year after my mother, my uncle took me to a party," Valens said. "You were there. And when Canio was finished with his entertainment, you came and sat with me in the garden until they came from the ludus to take you back. It was nearly dawn, and you smiled, and kissed me on the mouth and told me things would get better if I let them. And I thought, if someone in your position could think like that, then so could I." 

He stepped away further, went across the room and leaned back against the edge of the table. He was still smiling, albeit wryly, and his hands gripped the edge of the table so tightly that his knuckles turned white. And Castor thought about leaving. It was an overwhelming thought that he could go anywhere he wanted to, even back to the arena if that was what he chose, or find a place to live in Naples or in Rome and anywhere else in the world that he might go to. Maybe Gavius would take him on as a trainer. Maybe he could take on one or two of the high-money prize fights then, if he lived, find himself a house on the coast where he could live, somewhere that overlooked the sea, with maybe a pear tree or two. But he could hear the sea through the window, over Valens' breath. The fact was, he was in a house by the sea already.

When he went to the door, it wasn't to walk through it. He closed it, and he paused there for a moment with his hands pressed flat against the wood, and then he turned. He went to the table. 

"I didn't think you remembered that," he said, as he stepped in close and met Valens' gaze. 

"I didn't think that you did, either."

"You were memorable."

Valens laughed. He lifted his hands and rested them at Castor's shoulders, lightly, his thumbs brushing his collarbones and making his skin feel hot. 

" _I_ was memorable?" he said. "You were the most impressive man I'd ever met. The way you fought that day. The way you kissed me..." He ran his fingers over Castor's lips, his chin, his throat. He ran his fingers down his chest and tucked them down to the first knuckle into his subligaria. This time, of all times, his intent was clear. 

"I want you to know I didn't bring you here for this," he said. 

Castor stepped closer. He cupped Valens' jaw and told him, "You know, I don't care if you did." Then he stepped back and said, "If you don't take that tunic off, I swear by all the gods I'll rip it off."

Valens undressed. He wasn't subtle about it; he tossed his belt onto the floor and his tunic followed suit in seconds and underneath that he was naked - evidently he'd not had much time to dress once the alarm had been raised. His skin was faintly bloody and there was a familiar metallic tang of it hanging in the air but Castor couldn't say he minded that, not once Valens' skin was bare and he could see his cock was already half hard. Valens took it in his hand and stroked, slowly, pinching his foreskin up over the head then easing it back, exposing his tip as he stiffened quickly and all Castor wanted to do was go down on his knees and suck him, take him into his mouth and taste the moisture at his tip and suck him till he couldn't help but come. But evidently Valens had other ideas because he moved, went to the wall and turned around and leaned there, forearms to the brick. Castor bit his lip. His cock filled up just a little harder. And he couldn't help but think that if that was what Valens wanted, he was happy to oblige.

He went to him. He rested one arm against the wall and he leaned up against him and he ran his other hand right down Valens' back, down the long line of his spine down to the cleft of his arse. He sucked on his first two fingers for a moment, then he pressed them there between Valens' cheeks and heard him take a sharp breath in as his hole pulled tight against his fingertips. Valens chuckled breathlessly, turned far enough to flash him a wry smile, then tilted his hips back. Castor got the idea very loud and very clear.

There was oil on the table that he'd been using to rub his shoulder every now and then, which suddenly seemed much more important as an aid to the current situation. He had to leave Valens there for a moment to fetch it but he couldn't say he didn't enjoy the view of him there, pressed to the wall, hips back, head lowered, as he came back. He used the oil to slick his fingers and then press them back in between Valens' cheeks and he was tight there against his fingertips, tight enough that if he hadn't done it so many times himself he'd have almost thought it was impossible. But Castor had been fucked with the hilts of swords and daggers, tongues and fingers, dildos, other men's cocks - he'd been fucked on his hands and knees, on his back, bent over desks and against walls. And he'd fucked men, too, other gladiators, rich men's servants or the rich men themselves, behind closed doors so no one would find out they'd done it. He knew that after a moment, Valens' hole would give and let his fingers in, one at first, pushing in so he could take a moment to get used to it before he took the second, too. He felt it, his chest tight, as he pushed his slick fingers in and Valens squeezed around them, as he pushed back against them, as he hissed in a breath through his clenched teeth and told him with his whole fucking body that what he wanted was his cock. So, he obliged.

He slicked himself quickly, so quickly that he wasn't particularly careful with the oil and some dripped on the floor, and down the back of Valens' thigh, and when he shifted in close he smudged half an oily handprint against the wall. Valens laughed, breathlessly, but when Castor nudged the tip of his cock against Valens' hole, his laughter cut of quickly. He pressed his forehead down against the wall and Castor pressed against him, felt his cock slip up and rub against his cleft and then the next time it made a detour down, skimming off his hole and down across the taut patch of skin behind his balls. He rocked against him there for a moment, pushed one hand down there too and rubbed his tip against him until he found it almost maddening and really, all that he wanted was to thrust inside him. So he did; he kept himself in place with his fingertips this time and pressed there, feeling Valens' hole pull tight and then relax enough to take the head. 

He was tight, but Castor's cock began to open him up as he eased himself inside him. He was tight but the way he groaned and pushed against him said he wanted it so Castor didn't stop, at least not until his hips were flush against Valens' arse and his cock was pushed up into him as far as it would go. He rested his forehead down against Valens' shoulder and took a shaky breath and then moved, slowly, rocking his hips, but that didn't seem like enough for either of them. He pressed his hands to the wall and he rocked harder, deeper, but that still wasn't right. He did it harder, until Valens' breath hitched and skin slapped skin and Castor could feel sweat start to prickle at his skin and fuck, he got his fingers into Valens' hair and eased his head back, turned it, turned _him_ , just enough that he could get their mouths together as he moved in him, awkward as the angle was. Valens didn't seem to mind; he pushed against the wall to help keep that angle, so they could kiss, hot and wet and breathless, as Castor kept on fucking him. He rocked up onto his toes with every thrust and ran one hand down Valens' chest, pressed his palm against his abdomen with his fingers splayed either side of his cock, felt it twitch even before he turned his hand and wrapped it tight around him. He pushed Valens' tip between his thumb and forefinger, just the first inch, over and over though he wanted to touch him _everywhere_ and had for weeks by then.

When Valens came, muffling a moan against Castor's mouth and bucking hard into his hand, his hole pulled tight enough around Castor's cock that it made his knees feel weak. All he could do was push him up against the wall and lean close, letting Valens' cock pulse in his hand and his own cock began to pulse inside him; he came like that, suddenly, breathlessly, his eyes screwed shut, still pushed in deep, before he staggered back. He caught himself before he could actually end up sprawled on his back on the floor of his room, and when Valens turned to look at him there was a smile on his flushed face, tugging the small scar that ran across his lips. When Castor ran his thumb across that scar, when he kissed him there, that just made him smile all the wider.

It was dawn, and usually that was Theodora's cue to burst in through the door with a jug of water; that morning she definitely didn't, but if she had she'd have found the two of them together, fitting poorly on Castor's bed that really wasn't intended to house a man of his size, let alone him plus a sizeable guest. They gave up on that soon after and went upstairs, naked, servants they met on the way pretending that they didn't see. Valens' bed was bigger. They definitely fit together there, until they couldn't think of any more excuses not to rise.

They washed each other, slowly, touches lingering on scars, mouths meeting often. They dressed, both of them in Valens' good clothes. When he kissed him by the bedroom door, it was something almost like a promise; when he kissed him, they both knew he was saying that he wouldn't leave. Then they went to face the day together.

Perhaps it was a bad idea. Perhaps he would regret it. But when Valens smiled at him, Castor knew he'd stay to find that out.


End file.
